Calgary Children’s Choir Blog
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Math and Science In Music: Harmonics
Music is such a wonderful pursuit for mind and body because it is not just an art form, but combines a myriad of other disciplines, including mathematics, biology, and physics. This series, Math and Science in Music will explore the many ways in which music incorporates a variety of these disciplines. HARMONICS Musical harmonics are…
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Math and Science In Music: Muscle Memory
Music is such a wonderful pursuit for mind and body because it is not just an art form, but combines a myriad of other disciplines, including mathematics, biology, and physics. This series, Math and Science in Music will explore the many ways in which music incorporates a variety of these disciplines. MUSCLE MEMORY Our bodies…
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Math and Science In Music – Sound Waves
Music is such a wonderful pursuit for mind and body because it is not just an art form, but combines a myriad of other disciplines, including mathematics, biology, and physics. This series, Math and Science in Music will explore the many ways in which music incorporates a variety of these disciplines. Sound Waves The way…
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Math and Science in Music – Time Signatures
Music is such a wonderful pursuit for mind and body because it is not just an art form, but combines a myriad of other disciplines, including mathematics, biology, and physics. This series, Math and Science in Music will explore the many ways in which music incorporates a variety of these disciplines. TIME SIGNATURES Time signatures…
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3 Ways In Which Singing Makes You More Independent
Here are three ways in which singing can make you more independent: #1. Uncertainty: Because of the transitive nature of music, and performance, musicians must become comfortable with uncertainty. A performance will never be perfect; a piece never played the same way twice. In music, there are no absolutes, and musicians are experts at accepting…
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Joy In Singing
Singing has been shown to be beneficial in various ways; it improves breathing, circulation, enhances cognitive abilities, and lowers stress levels. But one of the best outcomes of singing, and particularly singing in a group is the joy and happiness #1. Good music: Music has the ability to make us feel a myriad of different…
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The Value of Singing With Different Ages
There are many reasons why it is valuable to sing with others, but it is especially beneficial to sing with others of different ages. Here are three reasons why: #1. Voice types: For many children, being able to sing with the full spectrum of voice types is something they have to wait until they are…
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Choir Camp 2015 Roundup!
This past weekend we were very excited to be out in Bragg Creek, on our annual retreat to choir camp! Camp is a great opportunity for our choristers to get to know one another better, to rehearse new music, and learn more about what it means to sing as part of an ensemble! We had…
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Welcome to our 2015-2016 Singing Season!
Welcome to another wonderful, musical year with the CCC! We have an exciting year lined up, with some new changes in place as our program grows and changes: – The Music Makers program has expanded to include two levels: Music Makers Level 1 is for ages 3 & 4 and is offered on Thursday from…
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Ottawa Tour 2015 – Day 5!
Today we started with the doors to the breakfast hall being locked, so after some confusion and some well placed phone calls by Heather Fradette we got our morning meal in lots of time. We then walked through Ottawa to get to the national arts centre and got to see some of the prep work…
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Ottawa Tour 2015 Day 3!
Today was a very full day, rehearsing en masse with the mind-bogglingly energetic and musically brilliant Dr Sirett. We were especially 8:30 in the morning when the rehearsal started, or six-thirty back home. We would love to learn his secrets. We were a bit bogged down this morning, too, with our formal uniforms for tonight’s…
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Ottawa Tour 2015 Day 4!
We started the day bright and early with an 8:30 rehearsal with Dr. Sirett, tired and groggy from “the grog”, the music woke us up. After a lunch on the fly, the bus took us by 22 Sussex Drive, and the Governor General’s house, en route to the Royal Canadian Mint. After a tour…
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Ottawa Tour 2015 – Day 2!
Today was a very eventful day. We went to the Museum Of Canadian History, the mall and had our first mass rehearsal for Unisong! We woke up quite early to grey skies and the smell of rain, making sure we were dressed in the right choir tee shirt for the day (it matched the sky).…
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Ottawa 2015 Tour – Day 1
What a day! Starting off bright and early, we met at the Calgary airport at 8:10 am. We took off right before noon. The flight was a little bumpy, but fun all the same! Granola bars and good company got us through the long flight. Arriving in Ottawa, we saw it was cloudy and…
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Spring Concert 2015 Roundup!
On Sunday, May 24th, in the afternoon, we had our final concert of the year; Madrigals and More, featuring the HeeBee-jeebees, and the Edmonton Young Voices choir. The Rozsa Centre was decorated with a spring theme, featuring lovely maypoles designed by our Creative Consultant, Kat Long. We were thrilled to end our 2014-2015 singing on…
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Introduction To Madrigals
Our upcoming Spring Concert on May 24th, 2015 is called Madrigals and More, and unsurprisingly, will feature a type of music known as madrigals! Madrigals are a type of music that became popular during the Renaissance period. A madrigal is usually a secular vocal piece of music, often unaccompanied by instruments. These types of songs…
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Ottawa 2015 Tour Shirts!
The Calgary Children’s Choir is very lucky to have a wonderful artist as part of our staff. Our Creative Consultant, Kat Long-Jones, recently created three new t-shirt designs for the choir to wear on our upcoming tour to the Unisong Choral Festival this summer! Kat designed these three t-shirts to be something the choristers would…
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Singing and Sports
As our Calgary Flames play in the second round of the 2015 Stanley Cup playoffs, it seemed like a great time to write a post about two distinct aspects of our popular culture that may seem incongruous, but are in fact closely aligned – sports and singing! Anthems: Anthems are extremely prevalent at sporting events.…
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Online Registration!
Introducing Online Registration! What: Online Registration will enable you to register your child for the 2015-2016 season via our website. Our online registration system gives two payment options. The first is to pay by cheque, and the second is to pay online via PayPal. Where: Online Registration takes place right here on our website!…
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Vulnerability In Singing
Music strikes an interesting balance between being an art form and a discipline. It is a difficult process to learn the intricacies of music; understanding the mathematical principles behind music concepts such as time signatures, intervals, and chord progressions. But it is equally difficult to learn how to approach music as an art form; learning…
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Multiple Parts VS Unison
There are many different ways to sing as part of an ensemble, as we discussed in our blog post A Brief History of Choral Music. When people sing the same part at the same time, it is called Unison singing. When people sing in multiple parts it can be homophonic music – when the voices move…
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A Brief History Of Choral Music
People have been singing together for as long as we have kept recorded history. The history of Western choral music as we know it today had its origins in sacred music. Gregorian chant was commonly used in churches as a form of worship. Monks would sing the passages in unison, blending their voices to create…
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4 Ways In Which Singing In A Choir Increases Your Confidence
Musicians often have a healthy dose of confidence. It comes from the self-discipline, self-awareness, and sheer amount of practice that is a part of the process of learning music. Here are four ways in which singing in a choir can increase your confidence: #1. Conductor: Despite the myriad of jokes about what exactly a conductor’s…
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The Value Of Not Performing
The Calgary Children’s Choir has three major performances a year; our Christmas concert, our Folk Concert, and our Spring concert. Sometimes we’ll have other singing engagements sprinkled in as well. Much of the music that we learn throughout the year is chosen for one of those concerts, but sometimes we learn music without having a…